In small libraries, there’s no reference librarian. All staff members answer the phone and respond to the questions, many simple requests such as directions, times of local activities, phone numbers, genealogical information.
Evadna Bartlett collected some of the others.
“Do you know the phone number for the post office? I don’t think it’s in the phone book.”
Not that weird a question
Maybe it’s weird in a small town, here in St. Paul, it is not that weird a question. The main phone book only lists one 800 number which goes somewhere, but not St. Paul. If you want to know the number of a particular branch, it’s tough to impossible. They used to have them in Reference USA, but USPS caught on and scrubbed most of them. Other reasons it might be tough to find:
1. It’s in the blue pages in the front, which the patron doesn’t know about.
2. They are using a cheap fly-by-night phone book that doesn’t care about government agencies. We’ve given up trying to get our listings correct in them. Why are there so many in this Internet age?
I got an antenna-related question this week, with HDTV they must be on the rise. I found this site:
antennaweb. org
what about santa?
While working as a circulation clerk in a public library, someone called and asked if Santa was real. It sounded like a young child on the phone, but I thought it could be a prank call. Not wanting to fall for a prank, but also not wanting to crush a young person’s fantasy, I did what any circulation clerk would do. I transferred them to the reference desk.